A Solar Eclipse at the North Pole

On March 20—which happens to be the Vernal Equinox (or the beginning of spring) for the Northern Hemisphere—the Moon will align between Earth and the Sun, causing a total solar eclipse as its shadow moves across the northernmost regions of our planet. Starting in the North Atlantic and following an arc south of Iceland and along the Norwegian Sea, the Moon’s shadow will exit Earth’s surface at the North Pole. This narrow path is the only location from which “totality” will be observed.

Totality occurs when the Moon completely obscures the Sun’s disk from view for observers on the ground, allowing our star’s faint outer atmosphere, or corona, to appear. For the March 20 eclipse, however, most of this path of totality is over water, and the only land that it touches is the Faroe Islands (between Iceland and Scotland) and on the Svalbard Archipelago.

For areas near but not on the path of totality—that is, from Greenland, Europe, northern Africa, the Middle East, and much of Russia—observers will see part of the Sun’s disk blocked by the Moon’s silhouette (a partial eclipse), and the closer to the path they’re located, the more of the Sun will be obscured. No part of the eclipse will be visible from the United States, where it will still be nighttime (but then, we’re saving up for the total eclipse of 2017 that will run across the continental U.S.).

To a hypothetical skywatcher at the North Pole, the view would be eerie. The Equinox Sun will appear to slowly glide sideways along the horizon, partly-set but never fully hidden. Traveling in an airplane at altitude will offer a better perspective. The Moon will slowly move in from the right, taking about an hour to completely obscure the Sun’s disk from view. For the roughly minute and a half of totality, the daytime sky will darken enough for the planets and brighter stars to become visible, with Venus and Mars shining to the Sun’s left and the stars of the Great Square in Pegasus just above.

Image: Luc Viatour / www.Lucnix.be